19 Fascinating Behind-the-Scenes Facts About the Harry Potter Books

In Philip W. Errington’s J.K. Rowling: A Bibliography 1997-2013, the author herself writes that the 514-page book is “slavishly thorough and somewhat mind-boggling.” That it is: A Bibliography includes everything from original interviews and snippets of emails to errors and corrections from one edition of the Harry Potter books to the next, shedding light on the editorial process of this beloved series. Here are a few fascinating things we learned from Errington’s book about Harry Potter’s road from manuscript to sensation.

1. ONE BLOOMSBURY EMPLOYEE CHAMPIONED THE BOOK IN AN UNUSUAL WAY.

Rowling’s former agent, Christopher Little, brought three chapters of what would become Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to Bloomsbury’s Barry Cunningham, who distributed the chapters among the staff. The marketing manager on the publishing team, Rosamund de la Hey, loved it, and wanted to show the editorial team that the book was something special. So, according to Nigel Newton, the founder and chief executive of Bloomsbury Publishing plc, she made 10 copies for the staff, rolled them into scrolls, “sellotaped one end, filled it with Smarties, sellotaped the other end and put a red ribbon around the scroll. That was their way of saying to us that they thought the book would win the [Smarties Book Prize] … which funnily enough it did.”

2. THE FIRST EDITIONS FEATURED A RANDOM WIZARD ON THE BACK COVER.

The cover of Philosopher’s Stone was created by Thomas Taylor in just two days; it was his very first professional commission. Bloomsbury also asked him to “provide ‘a wizard to decorate the back cover.’ So I did,” Taylor wrote in a blog post on his website, which Errington quotes in A Bibliography. “The books are full of magical characters and sorcerers, so it wasn’t difficult to conjure up one of my own.”

Readers frequently asked Bloomsbury who the wizard was, though, so they asked Taylor to come up with a replacement. “The original picture was quickly replaced by a clearly recognizable illustration of Dumbledore, probably appearing first on the eighteenth impression,” Errington writes. Taylor said that, until the publisher asked, it had “never even crossed my mind to depict Dumbledore.”

3. THE ADULT EDITIONS WERE INSPIRED BY A BLOOMSBURY EMPLOYEE’S COMMUTE.

The staff member reported that he’d seen someone on his commute reading the book behind a copy of The Economist. “One of us—it might even have been me—repeated this to a journalist … who made a thing of it,” Newton told Errington. “And then we thought, well why don’t we produce an adult edition? It was quite clear that this book was being read just as much by adults.”

The adult editions featured understated photographs instead of illustrations; the first—which had a photo of an American steam locomotive from the Norfolk & Western Railway Train on the cover—was published in September 1998.

4. THE AMERICAN VERSION OF THE FIRST BOOK COULD HAVE HAD A MUCH DIFFERENT TITLE.

Publisher Arthur A. Levine had just launched his imprint at Scholastic when he heard about Philosopher’s Stone. When he acquired the rights for the book, he knew he’d have to change the title: It needed to have a little more magic in it for American readers. “I certainly did not mind Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, but I can see … why a book that is titled Philosopher’s Stone might seem more arcane or something,” Levine told Errington. Harry Potter and the School of Magic was suggested as a new title; when Levine brought the idea to Rowling, she “very thoughtfully said, ‘No—that doesn’t feel right to me … there are objects that I would like. What if we called it the Sorcerer’s Stone?’ And that completely does it.”

5. LEVINE CAME UNDER FIRE FOR CHANGES MADE TO THE ORIGINAL PHILOSOPHER’S STONE MANUSCRIPT.

According to Errington, “There were around 80 word changes and some significant alteration in the placing of commas.” Levine told him, “I did not do anything to the text. Every change was something I discussed with Jo.”

6. NEARLY HEADLESS NICK ALSO NEARLY HAD A SONG.

When the manuscript for Chamber of Secrets came in, Bloomsbury editor Emma Matthewson wrote to Rowling that the book was “going to be absolutely brilliant! … [N]o danger of the sequel not coming up to the expectations of the first.” But the manuscript was “over-long,” so some things had to go—including a song for Nearly Headless Nick, which began “It was a mistake any wizard could make …” Rowling noted during edits that “this was ‘a wrench’ but admitted it was ‘superfluous to requirements,’” Errington writes. She later posted the lyrics to “The Ballad of Nearly Headless Nick” on her website; it’s no longer there, but you can read it here.

7. A GLOSSARY WAS SUGGESTED, BUT IT NEVER HAPPENED.

Early in the editorial process of Chamber of Secrets, someone at Bloomsbury suggested “an ‘information/glossary/history’ at the end of the book for those who hadn’t read Philosopher’s Stone,” Errington writes. “This idea, evidently, was abandoned.”

8. THE SCHOLASTIC VERSION OF CHAMBER OF SECRETS MESSED UP A PREVIEW FOR THE NEXT BOOK.

The publisher’s blurb said it was Aunt Petunia would be inflated in the next book, but that was a gaffe: It was Aunt Marge, Uncle Vernon’s sister, who Harry accidentally inflates.

9. PRISONER OF AZKABAN REQUIRED A LOT OF EDITING.

With its complicated time travel plot, it’s probably not surprising that the third entry in the Harry Potter series needed a closer eye than the two books that preceded it. The process took at least three months, and at one point, Rowling wrote to Matthewson, “I’ve read this book so much that I’m sick of it, I never read either of the others over and over again when editing them, but I really had to this time …” Later, she noted that “I’ll be hard put to smile when it comes to doing public readings from it.” Among the edits included bumping up the presence of the dementors.

10. GOBLET OF FIRE HAD A NUMBER OF POTENTIAL TITLES ...

They included Harry Potter and the Death Eaters, Harry Potter and the Fire Goblet, and Harry Potter and the Three Champions.

11. … AND THE TRIWIZARD TOURNAMENT WAS ORIGINALLY CALLED SOMETHING ELSE.

The Doomspell Tournament, to be exact. Matthewson suggested the change in a letter to Rowling dated March 8, 2000. (This letter also included the alternate titles.)

12. THE BOOK ALSO MARKED SOME OTHER FIRSTS.

Goblet of Fire was the first Harry Potter book released at midnight, and the first where Levine and Scholastic weighed in on edits during Bloomsbury’s editorial process.

13. NEWTON RECEIVED ORDER OF THE PHOENIX IN A “DEAD DROP” …

Newton had a clue that he would be receiving Rowling’s next manuscript when Little called him and suggested they meet for a drink at The Pelican—the same place the agent had delivered the manuscript for Goblet of Fire. Newton told Errington that he went to The Pelican “in a state of high alert. And I went in and there was a massive Sainsbury’s plastic carrier bag at his feet … he said nothing about that and I said nothing … we stood at the bar and drank our pints and said nothing about Harry Potter. But when we left I walked out with the carrier bag. It was a classic dead letter drop.”

14. … AND HE WAS TERRIFIED TO HAVE IT.

The series was so huge at that point that Newton said he was “almost frightened to be in physical possession” of its next book. He couldn’t tell anyone—not even his wife and kids—that he had the manuscript, so he hid it under his bed. Then, Newton stayed up all night reading it, disguising it by putting four pages of another author’s manuscript on top. (He did eventually tell his wife what was going on.) He stashed portions in the safe as he went; the next morning, he delivered it to Matthewson. “I was so relieved to hand it over,” he told Errington. Matthewson, meanwhile, had to edit the manuscript on a computer that wasn’t connected to the internet.

15. BLOOMSBURY COMMISSIONED A “HARRY POTTER BIBLE.”

In September 2004—not long before Rowling would deliver the manuscript for Half-Blood Prince—Bloomsbury began putting together a file, called the “HP Bible,” enlisting people outside of the company to help. The file, Errington writes, “was to assist with consistency across the series.”

16. THE DEATHLY HALLOWS MANUSCRIPT HAD SOME GREAT CODE NAMES.

To keep the highly anticipated book under wraps, a file of an early set of proofs was titled Edinburgh Potmakers. “This was not the only spurious title given to the novel,” Errington writes. “Another print-out of the text in the editorial files at Bloomsbury is entitled The Life and Times of Clara Rose Lovett with the thrilling sub-title, ‘An epic novel covering many generations.’”

17. THERE WERE QUESTIONS ABOUT CONSISTENCY JUST BEFORE THE BOOK WAS FINALIZED.

In an April 23, 2007 email, Matthewson made several queries including one about Harry’s healing abilities. Writes Errington, “within paragraph four of page 11 Rowling had written ‘He had never learned how to repair wounds’ and pointed out that Harry had used ‘Episkey’ on Demelza’s lip on page 267 of Half-Blood Prince. The question was therefore asked ‘But this is ok as it is not really learning properly to repair wounds?” (It seems it was OK: The sentence stayed, unaltered.) Proofs were finalized on May 4, 2007.

18. LEVINE HAD 71 QUESTIONS FOR BLOOMSBURY DURING THE COPYEDITING PHASE.

“I truly hope it won’t be stressful for Jo,” Levine wrote to Matthewson in the email, noting that the queries “are merely a result of the absolutely PHENOMENAL level of detail in Harry’s saga, and the extraordinary depth of her imagination.”

There was also discussion of Britishisms versus Americanisms. “If you mean underpants and not trousers here,” one note from Scholastic read, “can we spell out ‘underpants’ for the U.S., so readers understand fully how embarrassing this is for Ron?” The request was granted.

19. BEEDLE THE BARD GOT AMERICANIZED.

In 2001, Rowling wrote Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and Quidditch Through the Ages for charity; those books, which were supposed to be Harry’s textbooks, went out with the Britishisms intact. But for Beedle the Bard, written by Rowling as Dumbledore, the publisher wrote in a note that “we’ve decided that this book seems more like the U.S. edition of a wizarding classic, and therefore we’re using American spellings.” The American edition also included a footnote from Dumbledore explaining Christmas pantomime.

This list focused on Harry Potter, but there's so much more in A Bibliography—including details on Rowling's books written under pseudonyms and things she's written for various periodicals—making it a must-have for any Rowling fan. You can buy it here.

These days, we tend to think about The Scarlet Letter in relation to high school students struggling with their English papers, but we didn’t always see the book that way. When Nathaniel Hawthorne published the novel on March 16, 1850, it was a juicy bestseller about an adulterous woman forced to wear a scarlet ‘A’ on her chest by a community steeped in religious hypocrisy. Here are 10 things you might not have known about the classic tome.

1. HAWTHORNE WAS SO ASHAMED OF HIS PURITAN ANCESTORS, HE CHANGED HIS NAME.

Hawthorne, who was born in Salem, Massachusetts, was aware of his messy Puritan heritage. His great-great-grandfather William Hathorne came to Salem in 1636. As the Massachusetts Bay delegate, he tried to rid the town of Quakers by having them whipped and dragged through the street half naked. His son, John Hathorne, was even worse. As a magistrate during the Salem witch trials of 1692, he examined more than one hundred accused witches, and found them all guilty. Hawthorne detested this legacy and distanced himself from his ancestors by adding the “W” to the spelling of his name.

2. HE STARTED THE SCARLET LETTER AFTER HE WAS FIRED FROM HIS JOB.

Unable to support his family by publishing short stories, Hawthorne took a politically appointed post at the Salem Custom House in 1846. Three years later, he was fired because of a political shakeup. The loss of his job, as well as the death of his mother, depressed Hawthorne, but he was also furious at Salem. "I detest this town so much that I hate to go out into the streets, or to have people see me,” he said.

3. HESTER AND DIMMESDALE’S AFFAIR MAY BE MODELED AFTER A PUBLIC SCANDAL.

In 1846, Hawthorne's sister-in-law Elizabeth Peabody published the work of Hungarian linguist Charles Kraitsir. Two years later, it was discovered that Kraitsir’s wife had seduced several of his students at the University of Virginia. He left his wife and daughter in Philadelphia and fled to Peabody for help. Peabody responded by going to Philadelphia in an attempt to gain guardianship of the daughter. This didn’t go over so well with the wife. She followed Peabody back to Boston and confronted her husband. In response, Peabody and Kraitsir tried to get her committed to a lunatic asylum. The press got wind of the story and Kraitsir was skewered for looking weak and hiding behind Peabody’s skirts. Hawthorne watched as the scandal surrounding a woman’s affairs played out on the public stage, right as he was starting The Scarlet Letter.

4. THE PURITANS REALLY DID MAKE PEOPLE WEAR LETTERS FOR ADULTERY.

Hawthorne must have known there was historical precedence for The Scarlet Letter. According to a 1658 law in Plymouth, people caught in adultery were whipped and forced “to weare two Capitall letters namely A D cut out in cloth and sowed on theire vpermost Garments on theire arme or backe.” If they ever took the letters off, they would be publicly whipped again. A similar law was enacted in Salem.

In the town of York (now in Maine) in 1651, near where Hawthorne’s family owned property, a woman named Mary Batchellor was whipped 40 lashes for adultery and forced to wear an ‘A’ on her clothes. She was married to Stephen Batchellor, a minister over 80 years old. Sound familiar?

5. HAWTHORNE’S EDITOR TOOK CREDIT FOR TALKING HIM INTO WRITING THE NOVEL.

In an 1871 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, editor James T. Fields wrote about being Hawthorne’s champion. Not only did he try to get Hawthorne reinstated in his Custom House post, Fields said he convinced Hawthorne to write The Scarlet Letter as a novel. One day, while trying to encourage the despondent writer ("'Who would risk publishing a book for me, the most unpopular writer in America?' 'I would,' said I"), Fields noticed Hawthorne’s bureau. He said he bet Hawthorne had already written something new and that it was in one of the drawers. Hawthorne, flabbergasted, pulled out a manuscript. “How in Heaven's name did you know this thing was there?” he said. He gave Fields the “germ” of The Scarlet Letter. Fields then persuaded Hawthorne to alter “the plan of that story” and write a full-sized book. The rest is history.

Or is it? Hawthorne’s wife Sophia said of Fields’s claims: “He has made the absurd boast that he was the sole cause of the Scarlet Letter being published!" She added that Edwin Percy Whipple was the one who encouraged Hawthorne.

6. THE NOVEL IS ONE OF THE FIRST TO FEATURE A STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER.

Hester Prynne is a tall, dignified character who endures her outcast status with grace and strength. Although she has fallen to a low place as an adulteress with an illegitimate child, she becomes a successful seamstress and raises her daughter even though the authorities want to take the child away. As such, she’s a complex character who embodies what happens when a woman breaks societal rules. Hawthorne not only knew accomplished women such as Peabody and Margaret Fuller, he was writing The Scarlet Letter directly after the first women's rights convention in New York in 1848. He was one of the first American writers to depict “women’s rights, women’s work, women in relation to men, and social change,” according to biographer Brenda Wineapple.

7. THE SCARLET LETTER IS FULL OF SYMBOLS.

As you probably know, Hawthorne hits you in the head with symbolism throughout The Scarlet Letter, starting with the characters’ names—Pearl for an unwanted child, Roger Chillingworth for a twisted, cold man, Arthur Dimmesdale for a man whose education cannot lead him to truth. From the wild woods to the rosebush by the jail to the embroidered ‘A’ itself, it’s easy to see why The Scarlet Letter is the book that launched a thousand literary essays.

8. HAWTHORNE LOVED THE WORD "IGNOMINY."

In the 87,000-plus words that make up The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne used “ignominy” 16 times, “ignominious” seven times, and “ignominiously” once. He apparently had affection for the word, which means dishonor, infamy, disgrace, or shame. Either that, or he needed a thesaurus.

9. PEOPLE THOUGHT THE NOVEL WAS SCANDALOUS.

While the reviews were generally positive, others condemned The Scarlet Letter as smut. For example, this 1851 review by Reverend Arthur Cleveland Coxe: “Why has our author selected such a theme? … Is it, in short, because a running underside of filth has become as requisite to a romance, as death in the fifth act to a tragedy? Is the French era actually begun in our literature? … we honestly believe that "the Scarlet Letter" has already done not a little to degrade our literature, and to encourage social licentiousness.” This kind of rhetoric didn’t hurt sales. In fact, The Scarlet Letter’s initial print run of 2500 books sold out in 10 days.

10. HAWTHORNE DIDN’T MAKE MUCH MONEY FROM THE NOVEL.

The Scarlet Letter made Hawthorne a well-known writer, allowed him to purchase a home in Concord, and insured an audience for books like The House of Seven Gables. However, The Scarlet Letter didn’t make Hawthorne rich. Despite its success in the U.S. and abroad, royalties weren’t that great—overseas editions paid less than a penny per copy. Hawthorne only made $1500 from the book over the remaining 14 years of his life. He was never able to escape the money troubles that plagued him.

In the Harry Potter series, many of Voldemort's horcruxes were give rich backstories, like Tom Riddle's diary, Marvolo Gaunt's ring, and of course, Harry himself. But the most personal horcrux containing a fragment of Voldemort's soul is also the biggest mystery. Voldemort carries Nagini the snake with him wherever he goes, but we still don't know how the two met or where Nagini came from. Fans may not have to wait much longer to find out: One fan theory laid out by Vanity Fair suggests that Nagini is actually a cursed witch, and her true identity will be revealed in the next Fantastic Beasts movie.

On March 13, the trailer dropped for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, the second installment in the Harry Potter prequel series written by J.K. Rowling. The clips include lots of goodies for fans—including a first look at Jude Law as young Dumbledore—but one potential bombshell requires closer examination.

Pay attention at the 1:07 mark in the video below and you'll see Claudia Kim, the actress playing a new, unnamed character in the film. While we don't know much about her yet, Pottermore tells us that she is a Maledictus or “someone who suffers from a ‘blood curse’ that turns them into a beast.” This revelation led some fans to suspect the beast she transforms into is Nagini, the snake destined to be Voldemort's companion.

That isn't the only clue backing up the theory. The second piece of evidence comes in the trailer at the 1:17 mark: There, you can see an advertisement for a "wizarding circus," featuring a poster of a woman resembling Kim constricted a by massive snake.

If Kim's character does turn out to be Nagini, the theory still doesn't explain how she eventually joins forces with Voldemort and becomes his horcrux. Fans will have to wait until the film's release on November 16, 2018 for answers. Fortunately, there are plenty of other Harry Potter fan theories to study up on in the meantime.